Fishing for Sydney's toe

Deni called me at work this morning to tell me that Sydney had a fishhook in her foot. Having had a fishhook in my leg as a kid, I knew that if the barb wasn't showing then it would probably be a Emergency Room visit.

Deni explained where the hook was. I decided I would drive home from work to attempt to get it out myself before trying to get into the Dr. When I got home I had to cut off Sydney's tights, so I could get a good look at the hook. Cutting the tights was a traumatic event for my little 3 year old girl. Once I got a look at it, it didn't look too bad, as the fish hook had already gone in and was starting to come out on the other side. I grabbed my wire cutters, found a hook that was similar in my fishing gear and attempted to cut it, so I knew how hard it would be. It cut easily, which gave me some hope. Next was the fun part, explaining to a 3yr old that she needed to stay still so Daddy could get the hook out of her toe without hurting her. She was saying "no, no, no," and "cut it off". Both comments were referring to the hook.

Deni held Sydney and attempted to hold her foot still. I cut the eyelit off, pushed it a little more through until I was able to cut the barb. At that point, it came right out. Sydney was glad it was out. She wanted a band-aid even though it wasn't bleeding, so we got one for her.

After getting the hook out, I went back to work.

Wii played it

We sat down as a family last night and talked to the kids about doing their chores, etc. After doing that we asked them if they could have anything they wanted, what would it be. (hoping to hear that they wanted a Nintendo Wii).

Ryan said he wanted a play weedeater.

Deni and I looked at each other, surprised that he didn't ask for an Xbox 360 or Nintendo Wii. Deni's reply was, "Dad didn't get that, but he got you something else that sounds like "wii"deater. She had to say it a few times before he caught on that we had bought a Nintendo Wii. He was excited and we all ran into the tv room to play with it.

The first game we played was from the Wii Sports disk, Boxing. Ryan was first and had a good time. Deni videoed him playing. It was funny. We even had to put something in his way so that he didn't get to close to the tv. I can just see him hitting the tv while he is boxing.

We all played games. Baseball, Tennis, Golf. They are all pretty fun. The Wii is not your average a game console.

Wii have it

I finally broke down and bought a game console for our family. After taking a look at the Nintendo Wii, I became obsessed with getting it. The Nintendo Wii is pretty cool.

Deni has been trying to find one for the last week, since I (we) made the decision to purchase one. She found that Toys R Us had one this morning, so she quickly made the drive to Orem to purchase it.

I'm sure I'll have more to share about it later, once we actually get it set up and play with it, but for now, we are excited we were able to find one.

3rd anniversary of my 29th birthday

Today was the 3rd anniversary of my 29th birthday (uh, 32 yrs old). On top of it being my birthday, today is Sunday and it rained all day, not what I was really wanting for a birthday.

Other than it raining all day, my day was a good one. Deni and kids gave me a ice fishing rod holder and an attachment for my bike that allows me to pull the kids in their trailer. Until today, Deni was the only one that could pull the kids, as I didn't have the attachment for my bike,

I think she got it more for her, so that she wasn't the one always pulling the kids when we go on a bike ride, but I'm glad I have one now too, so that I can help pull the kids.

After dinner, my parents came over to visit. It's always nice to have them come over. We live so close and I think we take it for granted sometimes. I want my kids to grow up knowing their grandparents and learning from them.

Time for a bike ride

Deni and I went to a WorldWide Leader training from the Church. It was a great training on how to be better teachers.

After the training, Deni went out shopping for my birthday present while I stayed at home with the kids. It was such a nice day out that Sydney, Ryan and I went on a bike ride around the neighborhood. Sydney had a few crashes, but she got up each time and got back on her bike. She's just about outgrown her bike.

We were supposed to go to a birthday party for a neighborhood friend tonight, but the kids didn't eat their dinner and weren't being nice, so I made the decision that they weren't going to go. We had a hard 30 - 45 minutes when they both realized that I wasn't going to let them go, but after we got through that and I was able to talk to them and explain why I wasn't letting them go, things got better.

I had an opportunity to talk to Ryan alone for about 15-20 minutes that was very eye opening. We usually try to talk to Ryan about school, but he very rarely tells us details other than "things are fine" or "today was a good day" but he seemed to open up to me tonight and tell me a lot of his concerns at school, including other kids being bullies and not treating him too kindly. It breaks my heart that he is experiencing unkind kids at school. I'm not sure why kids are so unkind to each other. I had a good time talking to him and was glad I had the opportunity.

After we talked we played with legos and created spaceships.

Ice Fishing at Huntington Reservoir

Since work has been so crazy this last week, I thought it would be a good idea to take the day off and go ice fishing. I decided to try a new location for ice fishing this time. My dad and I went down south to Huntington Reservoir. From Spanish Fork, you head up the canyon on Highway 6, then head south on 89 towards Manti. When you get to Fairiview, you head up in the mountains.

We got to Huntington Reservoir about 7:30am to find that we were the only ones at the Reservoir. I thought others would show up, but we were the only ones there all day. Not another single fisherman showed up all day.

We fished about 40 feet from the Dam in about 30 feet of water. I only caught one fish. But it was my first time catching a Tiger Trout. A Tiger trout is a cross between a brown trout and brook trout and has a unique, dark maze-like pattern all over a brownish, gray body. They say they fight more than Rainbow Trout, but the one I caught was only 12 inches, so I didn't notice the difference. My dad caught 2, but we threw all three back.

As I was trying to find directions to Huntington Reservoir online, I found an interesting tid bit about Huntington Reservoir. The reservoir became famous in 1988 when the well-preserved, 9,500 year old skeleton of a Columbian Mammoth was uncovered during reconstruction of the dam.

When fishing was slow, we headed out on the snowmobiles for a ride. Around 2pm, we headed home. I had an enjoyable time visiting with Dad as we drove home.

Tonight we had a work party up in Lindon, UT. At the work party the kids were able to ice skate, play pool, basketball, and eat lots of goodies. We all had a good time there. I told Sydney that the work party was my birthday party. I think she was pretty impressed.

23.5 hrs over time

Had a meltdown at work this weekend. As of right now, I've spent 23.5 hrs since Friday night on the issue.

Today alone, I worked from 7:30am until 10:15 or so. I was so busy that I didn't eat breakfast or lunch. I missed church too.

I think about 5pm I decided I needed to eat something. At 7:30pm I tried to start to transition the issue to another co-worker, but that didn't happen until 10-ish.

Time for bed.

Bathroom break

Today while I was work, I was working with a co-worker over the phone that works on the other side of the building. I had drank a lot of water and was in need of a bathroom break so I told him to hold on for a few minutes, I put him on hold and I walked to the bathroom. As I was washing my hands I looked back to see my same co-worker that I had put on hold in the bathroom. Ooops. We had a laugh about that.

I value status, power, money and material possessions

We took the Young Men to the Department of Workforce Services in Spanish Fork for our Young Men's activities tonight. We had it planned for Tuesday night, our normal night, but something came up and we had to reschedule it.

We started out by taking a 180 question test to tell us what type of careers we would be interested in. I went ahead and took the test so I would know what I wanted to be when I grow up.

After answering all the questions, the test told me I had 2 areas of interest.

1. Enterprising Interest Area

People with this interest...
-are "Persuaders".
-enjoy leading or managing other people.
-often respond well to competition and enjoy leading teams.
-are willing to take risks.
-value status, power, money and material possessions.
-describe themselves as ambitious or energetic

and

2. Conventional Interest Area

People with this interest...
-are "Organizers".
-enjoy systematic, step-by-step work tasks.
-like to keep things neat and in order.
-prefer working in stable environments with predictable routines.
-are detail-oriented and persistent
-may describe themselves as efficient or dependable

The part I liked the most was the fact that I value status, power, money and material possessions.

After the activity, we took the boys to get ice cream at Macey's. While I was driving, the boys were telling me the fastest way to get to the store and one of the boys finally said, "Why don't you let Bro Berger drive because he is 16". The other boys laughed, but I thanked him for thinking I was so young. That got me thinking a little, so I asked all three of boys how old they thought I was. The answers were 26, 28, and 30. Not too bad for an almost 32yr old.